That was until this year's Oscars rolled around and I received an e-mail out of the blue:

"Holy crap, I just realized that I never emailed you after winning your Oscar contest last year. Found an email to myself reminding me to look at your site after the show. Ridiculous. Anyway, I'd like to thank my mom and my agent. Lemme know if you ever have an Oscar contest again."

I wrote back that a deal was a deal and I would still honor the contest. Chris is a Kirby Puckett fan and I told him I would put together a Puckett Prize Pack for him. I'm a Twins fan myself having grown up in Western Wisconsin but I've only really collected Kirby casually [my favorite Twin from that era is Kent Hrbek] so parting with some Puckett cards wasn't too hard.

As luck would have it, I was also working on a Mets for Twins trade with Reader Noah who replenished my Puckett collection with a bunch that I sent off as well as some I've never had.

Here are some highlights:

This is my all-time favorite Kirby card. It has the feel of those propaganda from last year.

1994 Upper Deck Collector's Choice #319 Kirby Puckett

1994 Upper Deck Collector's Choice #638 Kirby Puckett

This card is pretty cool as the Puckett photo is elevated above Gwynn's photo.